The Worst Years
by Back-From-A-Guilt-Trip
Summary: Sequel to A Life of Broken Things. Rancis knows for sure that none of them were going to turn out alright. One-shot.


**Disclaimer: **I do not own Wreck-It Ralph.

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**The Worst Years **

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Candlehead's hands were shaking as she poured the tea, and she accidentally spilled a little. Rancis pretended not to notice. A little spilled tea never hurt anyone. But there were a million other things that could.

Ever since the previous week's horrific incident, Candlehead's nerves were shot to smithereens. What remained of the destroyed mirror and trophy had been swept up and thrown away, but every detail of the scene was still fresh in Candlehead's mind. And then there was a second episode that occurred in the hospital not much later, when Taffyta randomly started screaming and clawing at herself because she thought that tiny Cy-Bugs were crawling all over her. It took a heavy dose of Valium to calm her down, and then she was put on strict bed rest. Unsurprisingly, Candlehead was curled up in the fetal position on a hospital chair and sobbing between her knees by the time Taffyta fell into a deep, drug-induced asleep.

Taffyta would be released from the hospital in a few days, and Candlehead was far from ready. She didn't want to face that nightmare again. She wanted her best friend back.

"I don't understand why this is happening to her!" Candlehead wailed helplessly to her friend. She hadn't even touched her tea. She'd just dumped in a tremendous amount of sugar and then forgotten that it was there. "Everything was okay after the reset! She was healthy! She was racing! What went wrong?!"

Rancis didn't dare tell Candlehead what he was thinking; that one day they were all going to end up like Taffyta, as punishment for how they treated Vanellope. They had mocked her glitching, and now karma was snatching their mental health away in retaliation. Taffyta was victim number one because she had been the ringleader. Candlehead would be next, since it looked like being Taffyta's caretaker was swiftly driving her to insanity. Then Rancis supposed that either he or Swizzle would come after. Swizzle had sunk into a deep depression because the girl he'd fallen in love with had flat out rejected him on the grounds that he had behaved cruelly towards a homeless person with a handicap, which (to be fair) wasn't very promising boyfriend material. Something substantial shattered inside of Swizzle that day. He barely smiled or laughed anymore. He wasn't eating or sleeping much either, and his friends were getting worried. Rancis too was suffering from a broken heart. Vanellope was in love with someone, and it wasn't him. He didn't feel like smiling or laughing anymore either. He wondered whether he or Swizzle would end up at Dr. Mario's clinic first.

_"I don't date bullies,"_ Swizzle's crush had spat at him, before turning on her heel and walking away. Swizzle hadn't been the same ever since. He had really loved her. He had been convinced that she was the one.

_"You were Turbo's little minion, and now you're just a big loser. Did you really think that Vanellope would ever choose you?" _Vanellope didn't know that her new boyfriend had said this to him yet, and Rancis had decided not to tell her. She wouldn't believe him, anyway. She was too enamoured to accept that her beau was anything less than perfect. Rancis had started taking sleeping pills, to drown out his rival's triumphant voice when it harassed him at night. Vanellope didn't know about that either.

Of course, his and Swizzle's problems were nothing compared to the hell Taffyta was going through. He couldn't imagine what being schizophrenic was like. All he knew was that even with medication, it was inescapable. At least there was a small chance that both he and Swizzle could recover from losing the loves of their lives, and from their guilt, even if it took years. Taffyta was never going to recover. Everyone knew it.

At the present, he could only reach out and gently take Candlehead's hands in his own. "It'll get easier," he promised her. But he was lying. Nothing was going to get easier, for any of them. Only Vanellope was going to be okay. Her worst years were already over with.


End file.
